Cult of Mac

As Brian Lam on Gizmodo today says about Apple “redefining print” for its upcoming tablet, it’s all about the content.

If Apple has learned anything from the iPod, it’s that a modern consumer electronic device is a three-legged stool: hardware, software, and media that fills it.

Apple doesn’t want to launch a tablet without media to consume on it. This is the mistake Apple made with the Apple TV: It’s a great piece of hardware and software, but the content isn’t there yet (especially the paucity of Hollywood movies).

So Steve has set out to persuade publishing houses, magazine companies and textbook publishers to make interactive books and magazines that make sense on an interactive, multitouch device. Here’s the key paragraph from Lam’s story:

“Some I’ve talked to believe the initial content will be mere translations of text to tablet form. But while the idea of print on the Tablet is enticing, it’s nothing the Kindle or any E-Ink device couldn’t do. The eventual goal is to have publishers create hybridized content that draws from audio, video and interactive graphics in books, magazines and newspapers, where paper layouts would be static. And with release dates for Microsoft’s Courier set to be quite far away and Kindle stuck with relatively static E-Ink, it appears that Apple is moving towards a pole position in distribution of this next-generation print content. First, it’ll get its feet wet with more basic repurposing of the stuff found on dead trees today.”

But what might this “hybrid content” look like?

One clue comes from Enhanced Editions, a U.K. startup founded by former-book industry executives that seeks to marry technology with traditional print publishing. “We have long-since seen the destiny of the latter bound to its embrace of the former,” the company says.

One of the dumbest decisions Apple made regarding iPhone and iPod touch is devices wiping all traces of an app when it’s deleted, but providing no means for saving preferences and progress. Unless you use an uninstaller to remove an app or game from your Mac, you can usually pick up where you left off after a reinstall; savvy Mac owners can also fiddle around with preferences, moving them between Macs to ensure consistency across machines in app environments or videogame progress.

iPhone and iPod touch don’t allow such things. Spend hours making headway in Peggle and then, for whatever reason, delete and reinstall Peggle (by accident, or through having a restore go wrong), and your progress is gone—you have to start again. It’s like 1980s arcade games after the plug has been pulled, or cheap, miserly Nintendo DS games that lack a battery back-up in the cartridge, erasing progress and high scores when the device is powered down. For a platform Apple’s pushing as the best solution for handheld gaming, it’s asinine that you cannot export and import videogame progress and save states.

There is a workaround, however, using the shareware app MobileSyncBrowser, but it’s not for the faint-hearted…

iHome combines the common iPhone doc and the ubiquitous iPod alarm clock into the iP88, a dual dock for both the iPhone and iPod that also serves as a customized alarm clock. The $150 simultaneous charging unit is the result of iHome’s understanding that “many households have multiple iPhones, iPods and docking stations,” the company said upon announcing the start of shipping.

There is a parallel with the cell phone. Initially, mobile phones were not that common, so one family could do with a single charging station. Eventually, multiple cell phones with accompanying chargers resembled a tangled snakes nest of cords and plugs. The result: companies created charging stations where multiple phones could reside.

But multiple docking is not all the iP88 offers. Along with convenient charging, you can customize how you awake: either with a selection from your iPod’s playlist, a tune from the AM/FM radio, or a buzzer. Along with the Reson8 stereo speakers, the unit comes with a remote control.

The alarm clock portion of the iP88 is what makes it stand out from the crowd of other dual docking station, such as the Gigaware model we featured earlier this week.

[Via iHome]

This an ad mock-up from Moscow agency Doberman Studio has me plenty confused.  Sure,  the sleek, round lines of the Mac Mighty Mouse might induce one to think it feminine.

Or is it some kind of commentary on gay marriage — i.e. did Mickey fall for the cartoon Mighty Mouse?

In the second version, cartoon mouse Jerry also falls prey to the seductive powers of the Mighty Mouse.

If you have a yen for MacBooks, we have two offers competing for attention. Both are 13-inch Core 2 machines. If you’re all set for hardware, Apple is pushing its Apps and iTunes wares. Finally, there are price cuts on cases – as much as 85 percent off.

For details on these and other items, check on CoM’s Daily Deals page.

Europe’s Alpine glaciers are going fast — some reports have them washed away by 2050.

To stop them, some Alpine regions have tried gimmicks like heat-reflecting blankets, but the Swiss region of Jungfrau is banking on an iPhone app to raise awareness.

Developed by the University of Berne’s Institute for Climate Change, the Jungfrau Climate Guide app, also available on iTunes, shows hikers where the effects of climate change are already visible and what scientists know about the subject.

For years, people used to bash Macs by noting the absence of what was viewed to be an absolute essential application. Though there’s still a hold-out or two (we’re still waiting for AutoCAD for Mac, despite hints to the contrary), things are much better these days.

No application, perhaps, embodies this change more than Intuit’s QuickBooks. The company abandoned support for business accounting software package on the Mac in 1997, then pushed out a superficial and generally disappointing port for OS X in 2003. But things started to look up three years ago with QuickBooks 2007 for Mac, the first Mac-like QuickBooks release in almost a decade.

Intuit’s newfound commitment to the platform continues with this morning’s announcement of QuickBooks 2010 for Mac (out in late October for $200), which uses signature OS X UI elements to create a more intuitive accounting experience.I had the chance to observe the software in action yesterday, and there’s a lot to be impressed by. Read on to learn more.

Finally, the team at Dropbox have released a native iPhone app. And it’s pretty awesome.

When the installer contains two spelling mistakes, it’s a sign you’re installing quality software.

From Adobe UI Gripes, a site that describes itself as: “Me moaning about shoddy UI inconsistencies and mistakes in Adobe products and how they get shittier with every release.”

Twenty five years after Apple aired its famous 1984 commercial, it’s Steve Jobs that is being portrayed as Big Brother.

In a remake of Apple’s famous 1984 ad, which famously portrayed IBM as a force of oppression, startup doubleTwist has Apple pegged as the oppressor.

Microsoft’s Courier tablet isn’t just a concept.

The company’s Research Lab built a remarkably similar device in 2008 called Codex. And in the real world, the Microsoft tablet is not quite as slick as the demos make it look.

ZDNet’s Mary-Jo Foley is reporting that Courier is more than a concept: it’s an “incubation project” slated for a possible mid-2010 release. Also, Microsoft is “leaning toward” building the hardware itself, like the Xbox, to speed the device to market, and presumably offer competition to Apple’s rumored tablet.

Check the video and pictures after the jump to see what it actually might look like in real life.

When people talk about classic gaming, they usually rattle on about really simple, playable games that are challenging but that a five-year-old could conceivably master. Such people were clearly traumatised by text adventures (now referred to using the rather loftier term ‘interactive fiction’) and have therefore removed them from memory.

These games were primarily text-based, with you solving puzzles via verb-noun parsers. As time went on, adventures gradually became increasingly complex and elaborate, with Infocom arguably leading the genre to its height.

Sadly and perhaps predictably, text adventures eventually got a thorough kicking. In the words of Richard Harris: “Graphics came along and the computer-using portion of the human race forgot all about 500,000 years of language evolution and went straight back to the electronic equivalent of banging rocks together—the point ’n’ click game,” which, he argues, signalled the arrival of the post-literate society.

But via the magic of the internet, interactive fiction clings on, and apps for playing the Z-machine format are commonplace. Frotz is one of the best, and it now exists as a free iPod app. I interviewed its developer, Craig Smith, to find out what he thinks of interactive fiction and why he brought Frotz to Apple handhelds.

Classic rockers Queen Tuesday helped boost the profile of Logitech’s Squeezebox Radio. To promote the $200 Squeezebox, the group’s “Queen Absolute Greatest” album, device owners will get exclusive access to songs, lyrics and photographs prior to the November release.

Introduced in September, the Squeezebox Radio streams music via Wi-Fi. Napster, iTunes and Sirius selections are supported.

[Via Logitech]

What do you get when you mix the old-style pedometer with the Wii and our modern obsession with health? The answer: the fitbit, a tiny wearable motion-detector providing you with a window into just how healthy (or not) are your days and nights. The $99 wireless gadget begins shipping today a year after its unveiling.

Borrowing some of the technology of the Wii, which tracks players’ body movement, the fitbit senses when you walk, run, bike – even sleep. The fitbit can either clip on your clothing or on a wristband. Data gathered by the device is then wirelessly transmitted to a base station. You can then either check the fitbit’s LED screen (which displays a flower that grows as you exercise more) or through fitbit’s “dashboard.”

Gizmodo has another mockup video of Microsoft’s Courier tablet concept showing how the device might be used for creative work.

The heart of the system is an “infinite journal,” an interactive work area that’s used to store and work on photos, handwritten notes and messages from colleagues.

But in four minutes of video, there’s just the pen. Fingers are used for navigation, but all the input is via pen and handwriting recognition. There’s no virtual keyboard to be seen.

It’s a pretty compelling vision of how a touchscreen device might be used in real life. I’m half convinced, but I can’t help feeling it won’t work. A tablet device has to be multitouch, not pen-based, otherwise it’s going to be  mainstream flop. History has shown, pen-based systems are niche products. The future is fingers.

The Apple tablet is 10.7-inch device that runs the iPhone OS and is ready to go, subject to Steve Jobs’ final approval, iLounge reports.

Citing a rock solid source with a proven track record, iLounge says the “iPad” looks like a jumbo iPhone with a curved back and an approx. 720p touchscreen. The device will be announced on January 19 and ship in May or June — the delay is designed to build iPhone-like hype.

It will come in two configurations: One with built-in 3G networking and another without. “Think of the 3G version as a bigscreen iPhone 3GS, and the non-3G version as a bigscreen iPod touch,” iLounge says.

The device is not designed for a work or productivity. It’s for media consumption.

“It’s a slate-like replacement for books and magazines, plus all of the media, gaming, app, and web functionality of the iPhone and iPod touch,” iLounge says. “It is not meant to compete with netbooks. It’s an iPhone OS media player and light communication device.”

And Steve Jobs is 80 percent likely to give the green light for a January 19 launch.

Why January 19? That’s the big question.

Processed food mongers Kraft thought they might cop some of Apple’s cool by sticking an “i” in front of a new product.

Meet iSnack 2.0. It’s Vegemite (for the uninitiated, concentrated yeast extract) plus cream cheese. In one handy jar.

(Forgive me Australians: it sounds like it should’ve been directly marketed as an emetic.)

The new Apple-esque name was chosen from 48,000 entries in a contest. The winning entry was coined by 27-year-old Dean Robbins,  who, we’re guessing because he’s also a web designer, is probably also a Mac user.

After a slow start this week, the Apple deals are again flowing. We begin with Belkin’s TuneFM transmitter for the iPod. This brings up an interesting question for iPod/iPhone users: how frequently are you tuning to your tunes or phone rather than actual radio broadcasts? The results may be surprising. We continue on with more refurbished iPhones from AT&T and wind up our top trio with an intriguing aluminum iPhone case – complete with stand.

As always, details on these and other bargains (such as the latest round of App Store freebies) can be found at CoM’s “Daily Deals” page.

After a 15-year hiatus, Apple has taken Newton Tablet developer Michael Tchao back into the fold.

Tchao, once part of the original Newton team,  will now be a vice president of product marketing.

Steve Dowling, the Apple spokesman who confirmed the hire did not say exactly what the man who helped create the grandfather of PDAs will be doing in Cupertino.

The NYT speculates that he’ll be helping define the market  for an Apple tablet; though they can’t resist calling the Newton a “groundbreaking but failed personal digital assistant. ” (Most other takes, including ours, say the product was axed when Steve Jobs returned.)

It’s not such a big jump from the Apple tablet to Tchao’s most recent gig, serving as general manager of Nike Techlab,  which designed armbands and running shoes to integrate with  iPods.
It’s just as easy, for now at least, to speculate he’ll be doing more in-house integration with these devices.

Via Mediabistro

What it is: A simple puzzle platformer in which you play Jeremiah the Frog, a cheerful fellow trying to escape Satan’s curse by turning floor squares red and green with his hops — all to the music of brilliant indie rock outsider Daniel Johnston.

Why it’s cool: Didn’t you read the description? Ah, well. The play control is smooth and easy to pick up, the graphics are beautiful and cartoony, and the soundtrack is amazing. I’ve only been playing for five minutes, but I’ve already heard “Some Time Spent in Heaven.” Better still, Jeremiah is based on a mural Johnston painted in Austin, Texas, who cheerfully declares “Hi, How Are You?” to people on the campus of the University of Texas. But it’s a good game whether you know that or not.

Where to get it: On the App Store, of course. Link. It’s only 99 cents for a limited time.

Via FingerGaming

It’s a well-known fact around these parts that Tweetie is the best of all Twitter clients (and it’s exclusive to iPhone and Mac, as all great things are). Today, we got to see just how much better it can get, as developer Loren Brichter and some beta testers shared their thoughts on the much-anticipated Tweetie 2.0, which should be released for both Mac and iPhone within the next week.

First, the bad news. Though the Mac version will be a free upgrade, Tweetie 2 for iPhone will be $2.99, given that it’s a complete rewrite (and functionally a different app). But it looks to be well worth your hard-earned $3 bill. Here’s a taste of the functionality:

• Full persistence (you can do something else and come back to the app, and it’s like you never left; who needs multitasking)
• Landscape support
• Support for Project ReTweet API and future geolocation APIs
• View threaded conversations
• Sync with Address Book for full communication integration
• Video support
• Drafts manager
• New compose screen, including @user picker, recent hashtags, multiple attachments manager and more
• Short URL previews
• Same code base as Tweetie for Mac

Yeah, you saw that last bullet right. From a functional standpoint, Tweetie for both platforms will be a single application, which means (most) of this goodness is coming your way. I can’t wait to get my hands on it. Take a bow, Mr. Brichter.

Via Mashable, Gizmodo, atebits, and Daring Fireball

When a gadget has a doppelganger, the differences between the two are automatically thrown into sharp relief. Because Seagate’s DockStar runs on Pogoplug technology and uses the Pogoplug interface, our review of Cloud Engine’s Pogoplug a few weeks back pretty much covers the DockStar completely.

The DockStar performs the same exact function as the Pogoplug: it’s an instant, easy-to-use internet connection for any hard drive. Transfer files to a USB thumb drive or portable drive, plug it into the DockStar, then access the files from anywhere on the Internet. But there are three differences between the two products — one of them a big catch.

Hit the jump for the full skinny.

Apple announced today that there have been 2 billion downloads from the App Store. But how many of those were paid, and how may were free?

The mobile advertising firm Mobclix claims its app analytics shows that paid apps represent 77.3% of the App Store, while the other 22.7% of apps are free. However, far more free apps are downloaded than paid.

“For app developers, this means it’s much harder to get your paid app discovered,” the company says.

The App Ranking section of Mobclix’s website reveals some other interesting App Store tidbits.

While there are 20 categories of apps in total, for example, the two most popular categories — Games and Entertainment — account for more than a third of all apps in the store. Together, the Games and Entertainment categories make up 35% of all apps.

At the other end of the scale, the smallest five categories — Social Networking, Photography, Finance, Medical and Weather — account for only 6.2% of the App Store.

The site also lists the most popular apps in the 20 different categories.

Did you know that Pee Monkey Toilet Trainer is the most popular book on the App Store?

More here.

OK, recently exhibited at the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art. (Huge version of this.)

When does an operating system UI element become a work of art? Is it when Artie Vierkant replicates it many times over and makes it into a huge print? Or was it art in the first place?

Here’s one of those ‘lifeboat’ questions: you’re on a snowy mountain, the rescue ‘copter is 8 eight hours away and your iPod runs out of juice. Do you a: listen to the whistling wind and stay toasty warm inside a heated jacket or b: hotwire your jacket to power your ‘pod? That may be the situation if you purchase the Refugium Jacket from Mountain Hardwear.

The $375 jacket claims to keep you toasty warm for 8.6 hours using Ardica’s 10-watt power source located in the coat’s shell near a person’s shoulder blades. The heat can be adjusted (there are three settings) by pressing a tab near the chest.

But for CoM readers, here’s the real feature: a USB adapter can re-route the energy used to heat the jacket to an iPod. Of course, it’ll cost you $50 extra to contemplate whether listening to your favorite tune really is to-die.

[Via Product and Gizmodo]